Daily Worship

The Word of Life Brings Contentment

Norah Summers May 01, 2017 0 0

Psalm 116: 1-4

1 I love the Lord, because he hears me;
    he listens to my prayers.
2 He listens to me
    every time I call to him.
3 The danger of death was all around me;
    the horrors of the grave closed in on me;
    I was filled with fear and anxiety.
4 Then I called to the Lord,
    “I beg you, Lord, save me!”

 

12 What can I offer the Lord
    for all his goodness to me?
13 I will bring a wine offering to the Lord,
    to thank him for saving me.
14 In the assembly of all his people
    I will give him what I have promised.

15 How painful it is to the Lord
    when one of his people dies!
16 I am your servant, Lord;
    I serve you just as my mother did.
You have saved me from death.
17 I will give you a sacrifice of thanksgiving
    and offer my prayer to you.
18-19 In the assembly of all your people,
    in the sanctuary of your Temple in Jerusalem,
    I will give you what I have promised.

Praise the Lord!

Sometimes a word leaps out at you. 
Four times over Easter-tide this verse came before me –
simply, directly, powerfully.
So it is woven into the themes and thoughts for this week.

Jesus said to her “Mary”. (John 20 16)

 

 

 

Words go back and forth.

 

God speaks, and I listen.

 

I speak, and God listens.

 

Thank you, loving God,

for the words of the Psalmist, 

written so long ago,

but speaking to me today.

 

I, too, call to you when I am in distress.

You hear my prayer.

 

You answer me –

even if it isn’t always the answer I thought I wanted.

 

I come to you,

unsettled in a whirlwind of anxiety,

shaking with an earthquake of rage –

burning with a fire of indignation –

 

and get a still small voice of calm.

 

I come to you,

diffident -

have I the right words?

hesitant to ask a favour - 

dare I presume?

 

And I am with Mary in the garden,

bewildered, questioning – 

 

they have taken my Lord away – 

where have they laid him?

 

And the still voice that answers  

is not at all,

at all, at all,

what she expects.

 

“Mary”, he says,

and in his beloved human voice,

in one word, 

there is comfort,

and peace,

reassurance 

and hope.

 

Lord,

hear me in my times of distress,

and speak your Word of Life.